2023 Missouri Revised Statutes
Title XII - Public Health and Welfare
Chapter 188 - Regulation of Abortions
Section 188.015 - Definitions.

Title XII PUBLIC HEALTH AND WELFARE

Chapter 188

188.015. Definitions. — As used in this chapter, the following terms mean:

(1) "Abortion":

(a) The act of using or prescribing any instrument, device, medicine, drug, or any other means or substance with the intent to destroy the life of an embryo or fetus in his or her mother's womb; or

(b) The intentional termination of the pregnancy of a mother by using or prescribing any instrument, device, medicine, drug, or other means or substance with an intention other than to increase the probability of a live birth or to remove a dead unborn child;

(2) "Abortion facility", a clinic, physician's office, or any other place or facility in which abortions are performed or induced other than a hospital;

(3) "Conception", the fertilization of the ovum of a female by a sperm of a male;

(4) "Department", the department of health and senior services;

(5) "Down Syndrome", the same meaning as defined in section 191.923;

(6) "Gestational age", length of pregnancy as measured from the first day of the woman's last menstrual period;

(7) "Medical emergency", a condition which, based on reasonable medical judgment, so complicates the medical condition of a pregnant woman as to necessitate the immediate abortion of her pregnancy to avert the death of the pregnant woman or for which a delay will create a serious risk of substantial and irreversible physical impairment of a major bodily function of the pregnant woman;

(8) "Physician", any person licensed to practice medicine in this state by the state board of registration for the healing arts;

(9) "Reasonable medical judgment", a medical judgment that would be made by a reasonably prudent physician, knowledgeable about the case and the treatment possibilities with respect to the medical conditions involved;

(10) "Unborn child", the offspring of human beings from the moment of conception until birth and at every stage of its biological development, including the human conceptus, zygote, morula, blastocyst, embryo, and fetus;

(11) "Viability" or "viable", that stage of fetal development when the life of the unborn child may be continued indefinitely outside the womb by natural or artificial life-supportive systems;

(12) "Viable pregnancy" or "viable intrauterine pregnancy", in the first trimester of pregnancy, an intrauterine pregnancy that can potentially result in a liveborn baby.

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(L. 1974 H.B. 1211 § 2, A.L. 1979 H.B. 523, et al., A.L. 1986 H.B. 1596, A.L. 2007 H.B. 1055, A.L. 2011 H.B. 213 merged with S.B. 65, A.L. 2019 H.B. 126)

CROSS REFERENCE:

Life begins at conception, 1.205